Chapter 2 - The Name Camilla Knew
Camilla left through the east entrance with her father, Arthur Ashford, fifteen minutes later.
Arthur did not shout.
That made him more frightening.
He was a retired Illinois appellate judge, chairman of three hospital boards, and the kind of man who had spent forty years teaching rooms to wait for him to finish a sentence.
At the front doors, he looked back at Enzo.
"You will regret choosing spectacle over judgment."
Enzo answered, "Your daughter brought the spectacle."
Arthur's eyes moved to Adeline.
Recognition appeared there too.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
Adeline felt it in her stomach.
He knew exactly who she was.
After the guests were gone, Enzo moved the conversation to his library.
Adeline sat across from him with a bandage around her wrist and his coat folded over the chair beside her.
Security chief Marco Bellini stood near the door.
Enzo's older aunt, Teresa Marchetti, sat by the fireplace. She had run the household since Enzo's mother died and had hired Adeline herself.
Enzo placed a photograph on the desk.
It showed Gabriel Vescari in 2009 wearing a dark accountant's suit, standing beside Enzo's father, Carlo Marchetti, at a dockworkers' charity dinner.
"Your father handled the family relief accounts," Enzo said.
"He handled one of them."
"He stole four million dollars and disappeared."
"That is what you were told."
Enzo leaned back.
"He was found dead in Indiana six weeks later."
"After he supposedly confessed."
"He did confess."
Adeline looked at him.
"You saw the confession?"
Silence.
Enzo's jaw shifted.
"I saw a copy."
"Typed?"
"Yes."
"Signed?"
"Yes."
"Did you know my father hated typewriters?"
Teresa looked at Adeline.
"What does that prove?"
"Nothing by itself."
Adeline folded her hands.
"Which is why I came here."
Marco said, "Under another name."
"Under my legal name."
"Without disclosing the connection."
"Would you have hired Gabriel Vescari's daughter?"
Nobody answered.
That was answer enough.
Enzo said, "What did he find?"
Adeline took a breath.
"The St. Vincent Dockworkers Medical Fund."
Enzo frowned.
He knew the fund.
Carlo Marchetti created it after a crane accident killed five men at the South Branch terminal. The fund paid emergency medical bills for dockworkers' spouses and children who lacked insurance.
Politicians loved it.
Hospitals praised it.
Carlo used to call it proof the Marchettis took care of their own.
Adeline continued.
"My father started seeing claims for surgeries that never happened. Hospital stays for children who were never admitted. Specialist fees for doctors who did not exist."
Enzo's expression tightened.
"Which hospitals?"
"Three. St. Bartholomew. Lake Mercy. Ashford Children's."
Arthur Ashford had chaired Ashford Children's for twenty-two years.
Teresa whispered, "No."
Adeline looked at her.
"The money left the fund as medical reimbursements. Some went to shell clinics. Some went into legal consulting. Some returned to companies connected to the Marchetti docks."
Enzo's voice went flat.
"Connected how?"
"My father believed someone was hiding losses in the port business by recycling charity money through fake health claims."
Marco stepped forward.
"Where is the proof?"
"Incomplete."
"Convenient."
Adeline looked at him.
"If I had complete proof, I would have gone to federal prosecutors instead of taking a maid's job."
Enzo's mouth almost moved.
Not a smile.
Close.
Then Adeline reached inside her handbag and removed an old microcassette.
Red plastic.
Cracked label.
G.V. - 11/4/09.
Enzo stared.
"What is that?"
"My father recorded meetings after he realized the books were being changed behind him."
"What's on it?"
"Only the first four minutes survived."
"And?"
Adeline looked toward the closed library doors.
"Your uncle Vittorio telling Judge Ashford that if Gabriel would not sign the hospital reconciliations, someone else would sign them for him."
The room went still.
Enzo's uncle Vittorio Marchetti had raised him after Carlo died.
Vittorio had also been missing for nine years.
Officially, he retired to Sicily.
Unofficially, no one knew where he was.
Then Marco's radio crackled.
"Boss, we've got a problem in the staff wing."
Enzo stood.
"What?"
A guard answered through static.
"Someone broke into Ms. Croft's room."
Adeline went pale.
The guard continued.
"They didn't take jewelry. They took the only thing she had hidden under the floorboard."
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